Pune, March 20 (IANS) Rahul Patil, a cardiology consultant at a private hospital in Pune, has developed a new procedure to perform angioplasty. Patil, 32, calls it peripheral angioplasty and says it is somewhere between a regular surgery and a stent procedure. This procedure is used to treat persistent chest pain (angina), blockage of one or more coronary arteries and blockage in a coronary artery during or after a heart attack.

“With surgery, the patient has to pay high cost and prolonged operative hospitalisation is required. The patient gets discharged after 10 days and gets more than 20 stitches in surgery. In angioplasty, there are no stitches and patient gets discharged in two days. It is time saving and cost saving on hospitalisation. Recovery is faster,” said Patil.

The cost to perform the new procedure is approximately Rs.100,000 and the procedure takes a maximum of 45 to 90 minutes. It involves removal of a blood clot using a balloon catheter (medically called thrombectomy).

At the 17th annual conference organised by the National Heart Centre at Singapore recently, Patil presented his case before 10 world-renowned senior cardiologists and 500 doctors. He was chosen as the “Best Young Interventional Cardiologist” for his innovative angioplasty technique.

Out of 46 cases, nine critical case presentations were nominated and from that two winners were awarded. “This award gives my procedure international recognition,” he said.

He has till now performed peripheral angioplasty on nine patients and according to him the success rate has been hundred percent.